Once, at the edge of a dark wood, there stood a henhouse famous throughout the valley for its fat hens, its warm straw and its excellent brown eggs.
The hens who lived there were comfortable. Each had a perch, each had a nesting box, and every morning enough grain was scattered for all.
There was only one trouble.
Foxes.
Now and then, in the deepest part of the night, a fox would come scratching at the walls. He was usually chased away.
But occasionally he was not. When a hen was taken, the others would gather beneath the old pear tree and cry:
“Something must be done!”
For many years, the henhouse had been guarded by a large, sleepy dog called Bramble. Bramble was not perfect. He snored. He occasionally misplaced the key. Once, during a thunderstorm, he hid under the grain cart.
But he disliked foxes and, on the whole, foxes were afraid of him.
Then one autumn evening, there appeared at the gate a fox unlike any fox the hens had ever seen.
He wore a blue coat with brass buttons.
He carried a silver-topped cane.
And around his neck was a ribbon upon which, in very impressive lettering, were written the words:
FRIEND OF HENS.
“Good evening,” said the fox.
The hens screamed.
“Now, now,” he said. “That is exactly the sort of nonsense I have come to end.”
Bramble rose from behind the gate and growled.
The fox smiled.
“You see?” he said to the hens. “Aggression. Hostility. Division. Is this really how you want your henhouse governed?”
The hens looked at one another.
They had never thought of Bramble as governing the henhouse.
But the word had a grand sound to it.
“I have spent my entire life studying foxes,” continued the fox. “I know their habits, their tricks, their secret paths through the forest. Who, I ask you, could possibly be better qualified to protect you from foxes than I?”
There was a murmur among the hens.
This was difficult to argue with.
Bramble barked.
The fox sighed.
“There he goes again.”
A young hen called Pippa raised one wing.
“Are you saying you’ve never eaten a hen?”
The fox placed a paw upon his heart.
“I find that question deeply hurtful.”
“But have you?”
“What matters,” said the fox, “is the future.”
A few hens nodded.
The fox began visiting every evening.
He gave speeches beneath the pear tree.
He told the hens that they had been frightened for too long.
He told them that Bramble had deliberately exaggerated the danger from foxes in order to keep his comfortable position inside the gate.
“Have you noticed,” said the fox, “that every time there is talk of foxes, Bramble receives another bowl of meat?”
The hens had noticed no such thing.
But now that it was mentioned, Bramble did indeed have a bowl.
The fox also promised improvements.
More grain.
Larger nesting boxes.
Shorter working days.
A second dust bath.
Free worms for elderly hens.
“And most importantly,” he declared, raising his cane, “not one more hen shall be lost to a fox!”
The hens cheered.
Bramble barked.
“Is that really all you have?” asked the fox.
How old-fashioned Bramble sounded.
How negative.
How terribly obsessed with the past.
And so, when the time came to choose a new Protector of the Henhouse, the hens voted.
The fox won by a feather.
His first act was to dismiss Bramble.
“This is not punishment,” the fox explained. “It is modernisation.”
Bramble was put to sleep behind the barn.
His second act was to remove the lock from the henhouse door.
“Locks,” said the fox, “create a culture of fear.”
His third act was to appoint a Deputy Protector.
The Deputy Protector was also a fox.
Some hens objected.
The Protector looked astonished.
“You wanted protection from foxes,” he said. “Naturally, we require fox experts.”
Soon there was a Minister for Nesting Boxes.
A fox.
A Secretary for Grain.
A fox.
A Commissioner for Night-Time Security.
A particularly large fox with one eye.
Each wore a ribbon.
Each carried papers.
Each spoke beautifully about hens.
And every morning, one hen was missing.
At first the hens were alarmed.
“Where is Mabel?” they cried.
The Protector called a meeting beneath the pear tree.
“My dear friends,” he said, “there is absolutely no evidence that Mabel has been eaten.”
“But there are feathers everywhere,” said Pippa.
“Feathers,” replied the fox, “are not hens.”
“There is blood on your sleeve.”
The fox glanced down.
“Beetroot.”
No one remembered planting beetroot.
Nevertheless, the official report was published that afternoon.
It was called:
A REVIEW OF RECENT HEN MOBILITY.
It concluded that Mabel had most likely left the henhouse voluntarily in search of new opportunities.
The next morning, Edith disappeared.
Then Gertrude.
Then Agnes.
Each disappearance produced another report.
Soon the reports became so numerous that the hens had to use a whole corner of the shed to store them.
The Minister for Nesting Boxes announced that the falling number of hens meant there were now more nesting boxes per hen than ever before.
The Secretary for Grain announced that there was more grain available per surviving hen.
The Commissioner for Night-Time Security announced that recorded complaints about foxes had fallen sharply.
“That is because the hens who complained have disappeared,” said Pippa.
The fox smiled kindly.
“There will always be people who refuse to celebrate progress.”
That winter was bitter.
More hens vanished.
And yet, every week, the Protector climbed upon an overturned bucket and declared that the henhouse was safer, richer and freer than it had ever been.
Some hens stopped believing him.
Others believed him more fiercely than before.
For it is a curious thing that when hens have been fooled once, they may admit it. When they have been fooled twice, they may grow embarrassed. But after the tenth time, admitting the truth can seem almost unbearable.
And so they began to defend the fox.
“At least he speaks well.”
“Bramble was no better.”
“All protectors eat occasionally.”
“You cannot expect perfection.”
“The forest is complicated.”
“Pippa is always complaining.”
When Pippa vanished, they found reasons.
Perhaps she had been careless.
Perhaps she had wandered.
Perhaps she had secretly been unhappy in the henhouse.
Perhaps she had never really existed.
One elderly hen even said:
“I don’t care if he eats hens. He annoys the geese.”
And this was considered a powerful argument.
Meanwhile, the foxes grew fat.
They lined their burrows with feathers.
They held banquets in honour of National Hen Safety Week.
At one such banquet, the Protector stood before a magnificent table covered in pies.
“My fellow guardians,” he said, “we have inherited a difficult situation.”
The foxes nodded gravely.
“There are only a few hens left.”
More solemn nodding.
“But we must ask ourselves: who is responsible?”
Every fox at the table knew the answer.
“Bramble,” they said.
And they helped themselves to another slice of pie.
Rob Walker 